


Metamorphosis

by Ultimatum



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Anxiety, Child Abuse, Happy Ending, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Self-Hatred, Suicide, happy birthday dave
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-03
Updated: 2015-12-03
Packaged: 2018-05-04 10:41:58
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,059
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5331188
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ultimatum/pseuds/Ultimatum
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>But it's whatever. After all, caring for others is just a gay cop-out anyway. The world is cold and harsh; bro told him that once. And there's no room in it for pussy shit like love.</p><p>Dave's learned that the hard way.</p><p>(birthdays become sort of a drag when all they remind you of is your dead brother)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Metamorphosis

**Author's Note:**

> as dave grows, he finds it harder to stand himself when he only reminds himself of bro
> 
> happy birthday, my son......

On his 10th birthday, Dave gets turntables from his older brother. They're used; worn and cracked in some places. One of the dials doesn't work and the paint is chipped in more than a few places. Some of the labels were touched until they ceased to exist, and still, Dave cherishes them more than he's loved anything else.

He keeps it under wraps though, his overflowing pride and excitement (because sincerity is so not cool), and takes the strife Bro dishes out later that day without any complaint or fuss.

That night, Dave wraps gauze around his arms and bandages his side, but he smiles to himself, alone in his room, because even with all of the bruises and cuts from a sword three times too sharp for a child to have to face, he feels as if he's done something right. Especially if his Bro took the time to buy him turntables, no matter how used or banged up.

The kitchen is stocked with food after that for an entire week and Dave tries to wrack his brain to figure out what it was that he did to make Bro notice him again. He wants to figure it out so he can do it again. And again. And again. He doesn't want to be forgotten again or ignored. Dave wants to be good. He doesn't want to feel like a ghost anymore.

But he can never figure Bro out. The food is gone after the 7th day and Dave is back to hoarding packets of ramen in his closet. He tries very hard not to care and instead realizes that in the end, it's his fault anyway. He's failed his brother's expectations somehow.

Even if he doesn't understand what he's done wrong.

\--

On his 11th birthday, he wakes up to a dead-quiet Texas morning. Dave pads out of his room just as silent as the world around him, hoping secretly that his Bro got him new photography equipment or something equally as cool. He's been working his ass of while they strife and has kept his complaining to a minimum for the past few months, hoping he could replicate his last birthday and how nice it was. Maybe if he's good, Dave reasons, Bro will look at him again.

He reaches the kitchen and is struck, surprised, when he sees Bro hunkering over their fold-out table, eating fruit loops from a big mixing bowl. Dave isn't sure why he's even so surprised, maybe it's because his brother hasn't been around lately. Maybe. However surprised he may be, Bro still doesn't look up or indicate that he sees Dave. The latter tries and fails to not let that get to him; instead, he goes to rummage through the cabinets to see if there's any food and only finds a pack of saltines. Alright. He turns around to go back into his room but can't force himself to walk back down the hall. Staring at Bro's neck with tickling anxiety in his stomach, his fingers twitch by his side.

"Morning," Dave tries, the useless word falling from his lips like a stumbling croak. It is devoured by the silence, and he waits a few precious moments to see if Bro will even acknowledge him and, more importantly, the date. When he doesn't, Dave crams his self-pity down his throat and refuses to cry when he sits back on his bed with nothing more than a pack of salted crackers. He busts them open and tells himself that it doesn't matter. Of course it doesn't.

Instead of being a sissy, he sits by his desktop and rests his head on his hand. He is greeted by messages of goodwill from his friends the moment he signs online, and that's great and all, but no matter how nice and loving Dave's friends act towards him, he knows that he's not good enough for their kindness. Somewhere in his personality, there's a glaring fault he's missing. One he needs to fix. After all, Bro is the coolest dude he knows. Bro is his entire world and all he's ever wanted to be. And if Bro is ignoring him, that means he needs to fix himself before he can get the attention that he craves.

 _You gotta earn that shit_. He tells himself. _You have to earn the right to be cared for._

But it's whatever. After all, caring for others is just a gay cop-out anyway. The world is cold and harsh. Bro told him that once. And there's no room in it for pussy shit like love.

Dave's learned that the hard way

\--

On his 14th birthday, Dave is sitting by himself in his room on the meteor. It's a cold and dark space with a single lamp, one that's been off for the three consecutive days he has locked himself away for. He's curled up on his bed with his face to the wall and the covers wrapped all the way around his body. He hopes that if he lays down for long enough, he will become exhausted and simply sleep through the rest of the day.

It's his birthday, he tells himself. He fucking hates birthdays, especially his own. Yeah, years of disappointment will do that to you.

Dave's phone pings softly from across the room, the dim light softly illuminating his desk in the corner. He ignores it with conviction; what time is it? He hopes no one is going to come knocking at his door. He just wants to sleep and forget about any memory perverse enough to invade his head on this wretched day.

A voice telling him to grow the fuck up. To stop crying. To get stand back up again. To keep fighting. No, Dave, you can't leave in the middle of a strife, even if blood's getting in your eyes. _What makes you think you deserve to rest when you're still weak enough to get the shit beaten out of you?_

Oh, Dave thinks, almost numbly. Someone's knocking at the door.

He doesn't make a move to respond. Instead, he lets himself writhe and soak in his depression pit (his bed) and marinate in his self-hatred juice (his thoughts). Yes, it's all fun and games here in Dave's Suffer Chamber.

"Dave," a gruff voice sounds from behind the metal door. "I'm serious. Open the door, shithole."

It's Karkat. How pleasant. Dave covers his ears and groans to himself. Just who he wanted to hear from. Not.

"Dave, please. We are worried about you." Oh. Double awesome. Rose AND Karkat, joining forces to take him out of his room. Man, Dave feels a surge of absolute joy overtake him. Again: not.

"I'm fine," Dave muffles out from under his blankets. And yes, that is the truth. He is fine. He is--

He hears the door unlock itself and light footsteps make their way to his bed. He curls up even tighter against himself and huddles closer to the wall. "Go away."

Rose kneels down beside the bed; with a tender voice and a gentle hand against Dave's shoulder, she sighs. "Happy birthday." He nearly jolts straight out of his skin when she touches him, but Rose doesn't move her hand from his shoulder. He can't decide whether or not he hates her or loves the shit out of her for coming for him.

"Ain't nothing happy about it," Dave grouses back. His voice is low as he desperately hopes that Karkat won't overhear them from the doorway and make fun of him for being a pansy later on. "Besides. I want to stay in here." He says in finality, confident that Rose can't make him move from his bed even if she tried.

Rose pats his shoulder again before standing walking towards the door. And leaving. Awesome. Haha. Dave bites his lip and rips off his shades when the door clicks in place. Closed. Rose left. Of course she did. Why wouldn't she, when he was being an ungrateful little shit? Wasn't he complaining all this time over not getting attention? Over not feeling good enough? And when he does get attention, he tells it to fuck off and starts back at base one.

Dave throws his shades aimlessly, angry that he was ever stupid enough to believe he could keep any of his friends for long after meeting him. John'll be the same. The second he fucks up they'll all be like Bro. "Dave who?" They'll ask. "I don't know anyone with that name." And they'll ignore his very existence. He knows they will. In a last ditch effort to keep the tears he feels bubbling to the surface at bay, he balls his hand into a fist and crashes it into his thigh. Over and over again.

Control the pain. Control it. Come on you piece of shit. _Control the pain and don't let anyone make you believe you matter._ Because Dave knows better than anyone that he's a piece of shit and that fuckups like him will never get love. Kids like him belong six feet underground, and if he wasn't useful to the endgame of his friend's survival, he knows he'd be dead by now. The tears spill over suddenly and Dave keens and shoves his palms to his eye-sockets.

Look, he tells himself, you're alone again. Wonder who's fault that is. Wonder who pushes away everyone from helping. Wonder who locks himself in his room for days on end while he has a tantrum like a five year old. Wonder who--

Dave's staggering breathing goes sharper when he hears the door creak open once more. He hunches his shoulders immediately, quiets himself to soft hiccups, and tries to make himself still.

"Dave?" It's Rose again. Oh god, his eyes are burning.

Get it together get it together get it together get it together get it together get it together get it together get it together get it together get it together get it together get it together get it together get it together get it together get it together get it together get it together get it together get it together get it together get it together get it together get it together get it together get it together get it together get it together get it together.

"Are you alright?"

GET IT TOGETHER GET IT TOGETHER GET IT TOGETHER GET IT TOGETHER GET IT TOGETHER GET IT TOGETHER GET IT TOGETHER GET IT TOGETHER GET IT TOGETHER GET IT TOGETHER GET IT TOGETHER GET IT TOGETHER GET IT TOGETHER GET IT TOGETHER GET IT TOGETHER GET IT TOGETHER GET IT TOGETHER GET IT TOGETHER GET IT TOGETHER GET IT TOGETHER GET IT TOGETHER GET IT TOGETHER GET IT TOGETHER.

She sits herself beside Dave on his bed and touches his shoulder once more, but this time, he completely pretends as if she isn't there. Rose thinks that maybe Dave is trying to play it off as if he's asleep, but she can feel the fine tremors of his body under her palm and hear the stuttered gasps coming from under the mound of covers. She softly rubs his arm up and down, worry creasing at her brow. A part of her has trouble understanding what's going on with him, which scares her. How can she be a seer when she can't even figure out what's plaguing one of her closest friends?

After what feels like hours of sitting together in the near pitch-black darkness of the room, with only the rectangle of dim light from the door to illuminate their bodies, Dave hiccups and shrugs off Rose's hand. "I hate birthdays." He croaks out. "I wish we had never fucking-" Dave lets his face poke out from the covers, but still dares not to look at the girl sitting above him. He is too afraid of judgement from her. From his friend. But the words keep coming despite the anxiety clawing at his stomach. "I wish we had never fuckin' made a calendar and figured out how to tell time on this hunk of shit." She'll hate you she'll hate you she'll hate you. _You're weak, lil' dude. You're weak and spineless and_ "I could've just let this stupid day fly by an' I never would havta think about--"

He cuts himself off with a sharp intake of choking breath. The tears come back against his will and he attempts a laugh but it comes out wet. Forced.

Rose sighs sadly with dull recognition in her heart. She knows Dave will not want to talk about this. He never wants to talk about his problems; she assumes trying to use any force at this point will not help. Instead, she promises she will be right back and paces from the room.

Returning with plates of cake and pizza in her arms, she sets them on Dave's desk and listens to the sound of rustling sheets, signaling that Dave has risen from where he had probably been laying for days. His eyes are rimmed red and his lip has been bitten until it was raw and scabbed over, but she prepares a warm smile and hands him some plates. "We were going to throw a small party," she confesses. "But I apologize. I hadn't, um, anticipated any possible negative reactions." Rose looks at her hands and shrugs, seeming a bit uncomfortable sharing the thought and effort she had put into Dave's birthday. "We thought it might make you happy, at least for a moment."

Dave thinks about all of the years he got nothing from his Bro-- all the years went celebrated and the days spent ignored and isolated. And Rose and the others had gone through the trouble of alchemitizing food for him. Preparing cake and pizza. Suddenly, he stands and staggers from bed, practically ploughing into Rose for an awkward hug.

He admits that he's not accustomed to this, to touching others. The skin-on-skin contact sends jittery nervous feelings through his entire body and makes him feel like he should be running, not embracing the fear he feels. Dave thanks Rose in a throaty wet voice, close to tears again, and pulls away from her with a sniff.

Rose, with a small smile pinching at her painted lips, hands Dave his food and sits down on the floor with him, and in the dark and pallid room, Dave celebrates his birthday for the first time in almost four years.

\--

On his 15th birthday, he gets a hand-me-down deep voice from a man who no longer exists and wide-set shoulders too scarred up to even take pride in.

Every time he crosses paths with the mirror, the image he comes to face is so like his brother's that he sometimes flinches back as if expecting an ambush from his reflection: the ghost image of a man he keeps thinking he's seeing. The dead man who haunts him like a lingering nightmare.

From Rose he receives a badly knitted Christmas sweater, which she promises was on purpose, with missed stitches and an orange reindeer on the front paired with gaudy gold-and-tinsel threat rimming the cuffs. He promises her he'll cherish it, and Dave slips it on as soon as he can.

From Karkat he recieves a very bro-esque fistbump and the promise of a movie marathon later that night (Dave had miraculously gone from "On Karkat's Shit List" to "The Best Human On The Meteor"). Dave nods his head, but says nothing.

Something else has been nagging at him lately, something that rests heavy on his chest like an elephant.

Dave sits down in the hallway outside of his room and looks at his hands, boxy and all too familiar. He knows that his jaw is more angular than ever, his cheek-bones just like Bro's, his voice cutting and smooth like the dead man's. He's a carbon copy of the same guy who used to treat him like a pest, and in the end, he's sure he's going to end up just like his brother when they get out of this goddamn game. He's predestined to continue the cycle of abuse, he tells himself, it's all he's ever known.

Later that night, Karkat asks him why he's crying when they're half way through Troll Princess Bride. Dave lifts his hand, awestruck, and runs his fingers along his cheek, surprised to find the damp wetness on his fingers. He laughs, and it sounds wet and disgusting, just like it did the last time he cried out openly, and cracks a joke about wanting to fuck the troll dude who keeps saying that one word. Yeah. Inconceivable. Karkat punches him in the arm jokingly and still somewhat worriedly, but Dave's too focused on how the words coming from his mouth just then didn't even sound like his own to care about how much he's worrying those around him.

Dave admits to himself that he doesn't even feel like a person anymore. He just feels like the shadow of a man over a foot taller than him, mimicking his movements like puppet on strings. Maybe he was destined to become Bro's marionette one day; a lifeless doll for him to control. After all, he can't even imagine Bro just _dying_ without attempting to pull the strings, even in the afterlife.

Maybe that's what this is, Dave thinks. Maybe Bro is in his mind, pulling strings, even now, yanking and leading and controlling controlling controlling. He scoffs at himself right after the thought occurs, and Karkat looks at him questioningly. "It's nothing." He assures. "Just thought of something funny."

Karkat looks at him strangely; at his drying tears and wobbly grin, but otherwise says nothing. Dave thinks he must be afraid of saying the wrong thing, and Dave agrees: he's afraid of himself too.

\---

On his 17th birthday, Dave wakes up from a nightmare with cottonmouth and aching muscles. The previous day, he had hit the gym and didn't stop running on the treadmill until he started to see stars and felt a burning ache in the middle of his chest. He knew what day was coming, and he knew that it would suck (again) and he'd need to evade intrusive thoughts about he-who-must-not-be-named (again). So, instead of thinking about the date or what it represented, he ran himself half to death and went home to sleep away his worries.

The game itself had ended mere months ago, and although a planet shared by both trolls and humans was given to them on a silver platter, Dave still finds it hard to find any sort of peace within himself, no matter how hard he tries. Despite being able to live near his friends and despite the peaceful life they have all been provided as their reward, he still feels wholly at odds with himself.

Dave had moved in with Karkat after the first suicide attempt, and the weight of being a burden to his partner, his matesprit, is far worse than any disappointment he's ever garnered from Bro. Dave wishes he could wipe Bro from his memory, make the voice go away, the voice telling him he's worthless and that everyone hates him, he wants it all to stop. And although he adores John's Dad more than he'd like to admit, and appreciates Rose's mom, and admires Jade's Grandpop, being around them is starting to hurt. A lot.

Because he's not sure if Bro just wasn't brought back like the others or if he had just... Left. Realized he was alive again and didn't have to take care of a snot-nosed shithead anymore. Realized that he could leave and Dave could torment and hate himself all on his own. Yeah, he didn't need Bro's help with that anymore.

Dave sits up from bed suddenly on the morning of his birthday, coated in a sheen of slick sweat. He shutters, breathes in, and chokes on the visions of Texan heat and swords and puppets and hats that try to force their way back down his throat. Sometimes, he thinks his body knows the date better than he does; it reacts as the seasons change. From spring to summer to fall. To a pit forming in his stomach the day thanksgiving passes. To winter: a reminder of all the things he never had.

He presses a shaking hand to his stomach and grimaces when his shirt sticks, wet, to his back. All it reminds him of is how Bro used to strife him until he couldn't even stand. Until he'd be drenched in sweat and blood-- Fuck, he thinks he's going to vomit.

Dave moves to get out of bed, but the moment he steps out, he collapses, exhausted and tired and sick to his stomach, and he groans for Karkat, who's only ten feet away in his recuperacoon, but still feels worlds away. His entire body is hot and cold and flashing temperatures. Wow, what a wonderful birthday. Dave, you can finally be the dancing queen. Young and only 17.

Karkat finally hears Dave tapping hopelessly on the hardwood after a while and peels himself tiredly from his slime. Hazily, through his cloud of tired sedation, he notices a body on the floor, and rushes to Dave, still dripping slime.

"Holy shit, are you alright?" Karkat has learned a lot about humans over the past few years, from their sicknesses to body parts (ew) to their dumb cultures. Even with this knowledge, he's afraid. He's afraid of not knowing what's wrong with Dave, he hates how elusive he is. He hates it. With a tinge of desperation in his voice as he towels the slime from his face, he says: "Dave, get up." and regrets it the moment it slips from his mouth.

It's always around his birthday, Karkat thinks to himself. Why is he always so fucking _stupid?_

It's like a switch is flipped. Dave's breath gets faster and faster until his vision begins to spot and his weak _useless_ body begins to tremble. Get up get up  
get up get up get up get up get up get up get up **get up**. He tries, he does, but with Bro's voice sounding in his head ~~(the same pitch as his voice. it's like he's slowly turning into his brother. he's turning into a monster)~~ he collapses when he tries to sit up and the hyperventilating breaths he take only worsen.

He can hear Karkat freak out beside him, hands fluttering near his skin without actually touching him.

...

The panic attack lasts another ten minutes, and after it ends, Dave refuses to leave his room for a whole week despite Karkat's imploring. He sits under his covers with a fever and thinks about all of the things he's done wrong, and rationalizes why he deserves every single shitty thing happening in his life. Because he's terrible, he thinks.

He's terrible.

\--

Thing's don't get better. He's a hassle to deal with and he knows it.

\--

He's tired of being sad. Tired of being tired.

\--

On his 19th birthday, Dave decides that he needs professional help. He's tried to kill himself a grand total of three times. Intoxication. Drugs. Medicine. Nothing has worked for him, and the pressure of being a burden only worsens as everyone around him, one by one, realizes how despondent Dave actually is. How fucked up and sad he is constantly. The depression and fear bleeds through him as naturally as the blood in his veins, all consuming. He spends nights thrashing in bed, sweating through nightmares, and crying himself to sleep; looking at himself, Dave cannot remember the last time he genuinely smiled.

Sometimes, he stays silent for weeks on end just so he doesn't have to hear his own disgusting voice. Sometimes, he puts sheets over the mirrors in their house, just so he won't see his face.

He's sick of living in a dead man's shadow.

He leaves the house that morning and walks the two blocks west to Rose's home. Dave knows it's a bit early, but he's sure she won't mind that much. She's been wanting this for Dave for years, has always known something was up without him explicitly saying it. Now, he's ready to get help too. For the sake of getting better. Of _being_ better.

With shaking hands, he rings the doorbell.

And breathes.

\--

 


End file.
